Nintendo Wii owners will get a chance to Skate Itthis fall, but EA hasn't forgotten that those with current-gen HD consoles are also ready for their own follow-up to the game that made the last Tony Hawklook like a turkey. Two new videos posted to the official Skate site -- "What happened to that Dude?" and "What happened to San Vanelona?" -- feature skaters talking up players' feats in the first game and about how the city has changed since then, before heading into some brief gameplay clips and a teaser logo for Skate 2 (above).
According to the skaters in the clips, five years have passed in the gameworld -- Skate's fictional city of San Vanelona -- and large corporations have spearheaded a big-time crackdown on skating. They talk of harsher punishment than mere tickets and how obstacles have been put in place near rails and other prime trick spots to discourage skaters. Still, the second clip shows a skater and his board perched defiantly atop a concrete block with a "No Skateboarding" sign affixed to it. So, skateboarding is a crime after all -- at least in Skate 2 -- and it looks like you'll be sticking it to the man (in this case, big business) a la Marc Ecko's Getting Up: Contents Under Pressure.
Sorry to crush your dreams, er, nightmares, Ludwig, but we've confirmed that Pennywise the clown will not feature in EA's Skate It for Wii. However, the game, which was skated out publically yesterday evening at EA's "Spring Break" event in San Francisco, will make use of the Wiimote for some strikingly easy, yet precise control.
At its unveiling, Skate It was touted "not built from the ground up for Wii" by its dev team -- an odd way of stating the obvious fact that they are simply building on the core gameplay of Skate, while destroying the gameworld. Wait ... what?
We really wanted to use the above image again. It's like Tim Curry is clawing his way out of the page!
We genuinely thought you'd be interested to see some screenshots of the Wii and DS versions of EA's well-received Skate.
Skate It promises to fully adapt the franchise's controls for Nintendo's platforms, with the Wii version supporting both the Wii remote and the Wii Balance Board, ideal for "the full on immersive types."
Much to the disappointment of many a Stephen King fan, the "It" meant to be skated is not, in fact, the psychotic clown that gobbles up kids and makes your tea turn into blood. Skate It's executive producer, Scott Blackwood, tells IGN (you know, those guys who unofficially revealed Skate's Wii and DS incarnations last month) that the "It" is largely up to you. "Rails, pools, ledges, banks, mega-ramps, gnarly downhill streets ... you make the call."
Blackwood explains that the team behind the well-received original game "are working co-operatively with partner studios to make Skate It," with DS development duties handled by UK developer Exient. Why bother bringing Skate to the Wii? Blackwood is glad you asked: "It's all about bringing that authentic Skate feeling to the Wii remote and stylus, or and for the full on immersive types, the Wii Balance Board." And here we thought a port of Sega's Top Skater would be the first one to let us do an alley-oop in the living room.
Oh, IGN, you so crazy. Yesterday, it was posting a story about Pandemic working on a Batman game and then promptly removing it. Today (well, technically last night) it's skatebeing ported to Wii and DS. The story apparently went up Tuesday and was soon removed.
What's interesting is that both the mysterious Batman project and skate are EA titles. So ... did IGN get some exclusive info and then let the bat out of the bag too early, deleting them moments before uncle EA could wrest his whippin' belt free from his dungarees? We're betting yes, but we'll almost certainly never know.
[Update: If you're interested, here's the cached article, thanks to tipster Robber Tom.]
In a move that will shock the industry, EA revealed to analysts that sequels to Burnout: Paradiseand Skate are in the works. More specifically, EA Games president Frank Gibeau said the two series would "see extension" before April of 2009. Extensions? Can't you just taste the vision?
Gibeau also said that after a disappointing sales year,Need for Speed would be returning to the touchstones that made it a hit before, and adding open-world racing and a new "highway battle mode" -- does it count as stealing if you do it from your own company? It's a great time to be alive for people who love EA games, but hate being surprised.
Electronic Arts might have found a contender for Tony Hawk's throne, as the publisher's skateboard title Skate enjoyed almost double the sales of the pro skater's latest. In yesterday's earning call report, EA reported, "on current generation systems, Skate outsold Tony Hawk [Proving Ground] nearly 2 to 1."
Although Skate had a one-month head start in both US and Europe, both titles were out long enough to be well-stocked for the crucial holiday season. While we're glad to have a quality competitor in the long-dominated skateboarding genre, we can only foresee a constant stream of bickering between the EA and Tony Hawk publisher Activision Blizzard at the Annual Giant Game Publishers Valentine's Day Dance.
One of the major trends of this console generation is the prominence of downloadable content, released sometimes simultaneously with the title itself. That's why it's so surprising to us that Electronic Arts, one of the pureyors of the DLC for consoles, will not be offering any downloadable content for SKATE.
In an interview with EGM, executive producer Scott Blackwood said that they are "not planning any new content for Skate 1 ... We didn't want to go back and ask [people] for more money to get more shoes and shirts." Blackwood added,"that's not how we wanted to enter this market."
Blackwood also lamented on the dearth of female characters in the game, noting that "we are going to make it up to [the players]. When we do it -- and we will -- it's going to be done very well." Given that DLC is reportedly not an option for the first title, look for female skaters -- and the possibility of paying a premium for more in-game shoes and shirts -- in the inevitable sequel, SKATE 2.
We're in a bit of a mellow mood tonight, having just taken our first foray into online four player co-op in Halo 3. Oh yeah, and on the Legendary setting. Can we just say that having four people blasting away makes it about a beelyun times easier? Oh, and a lot messier. There were tons of betrayals, but what are ya gonna do.
So, to take things down a few notches, we decided to post a video worthy of the chilled out mood we're in now. Namely this Skate video that features a player bailing right into a kicked back sit down. It's not quite as laid back as the sit down in the video at the bottom of this page, but we couldn't figure out how to embed that one without our brains exploding, so you sort of get two videos tonight for the low price of one.
Sometimes ragdoll physics can actually prove more natural. Sure, most crashes don't send you floating and flipping effortless through the wind, regardless of the laws of gravity, but those crashes aren't nearly as fun.
Take this video, for instance. In reality, this guy would've likely fallen headfirst and spend hours trying to find his brain on the ground -- not because it fell far, but can you imagine how hard it is to find something when you lack cognitive function? Thankfully, we don't have to worry about such philosophical queries; instead, enjoy the video embedded after the break.
For the first time in a very long time, Tony Hawk has some real competition this year from EA's Skate. Though Tony Hawk Proving Ground has already won the award for most appropriate title of the year, the contest for the top skating franchise is still wide open. With the Skate demo already available, you can now officially lay odds on how the battle will pan out as the THPG demo backside kickflips its way on to Xbox Live.
You've seen the comparison videos, now you can get some hands-on time with both. Here's the big question: Which one will you be getting? Will you welcome a new succinctly-titled overlord, or will you keep Tony in his throne?
After being held up for six days, EA's Skate demo has finally arrived on Xbox live, begging to be downloaded and obsessed over. We're just a tad bit obsessed with it ourselves, going as far as calling it "a spiritual experience." Will you reach gaming nirvana as well? Not unless you can achieve that state within thirty minutes of this timed demo.
Your thirty minutes in heaven takes place in the community center skate park in the suburbs and it's fully equipped to experience a good chunk of what's possible in Skate. After a brief tutorial of the flick-it controls, you'll be let loose on the park, free to do whatever you please.
What really makes this demo special is the ability to save and upload a movie using the saved films feature so please, feel free to share your creations with the rest of the class. As for PlayStation 3 owners, your demo will be arriving sometime soon as folks at EA have said that it's been completed, sent out and is now in Sony's hands.
Originally due out on August 15th, EA's Scott Blackwood has announced that the Xbox 360 demo for Skate has been hit with a short delay. How short? In an official forum post, Blackwood says, "We're not quite sure yet ... hopefully not more than a week."
We spoke with EA about the cause for this delay and their spokesperson told us, "We are trying something completely new for an Xbox Marketplace demo in allowing people to play the game and upload footage they take in-game to our Skate website. The skate.reel video upload functionality is much more technically complex than a standard offline demo, and the number of moving parts have resulted in undue & hard-to-predict delays." Having recently played the demo area (and well beyond) and scoped out the included features, we assure you that it'll be worth the wait.
The good news is that this delay has no bearing whatsoever on the final game, which will still be shipping out on September 12th for the Xbox 360 and September 24th for the PlayStation 3.
After Jake Brown showed us just how dangerous a mega ramp can be at the X Games last night, we've felt a bit queasy just thinking about our favorite skaters taking on the colossal structure. It being X Games weekend and all, leave it to EA to show off that portion of Skate, along with an absolutely terrifying trip down the mega ramp.
You won't be taking that plunge on August 15th when you get your hands on the demo, so behind the cut we have the street portion of their X Games trailers which is a bit more in line with what you'll be able to accomplish. Chris Haslam? In our video games? Oh, happy days are here.
Sometimes ragdoll physics can actually prove more natural. Sure, most crashes don't send you floating and flipping effortless through the wind, regardless of the laws of gravity, but those crashes aren't nearly as fun.
